Here's a little story of a very low level threat. In Paris walking up a hill to a church there is what is called the "wrist band mafia". They grab your wrist, put a band on it and expect you to pay for it. They tried this on me. I did a simple twist of my arm to get out of the hold so he couldn't put the band on, said "don't touch me!" and kept walking up the hill. When I was at the top, the guy started shouting at me to come back down and fight him!!! I shouted back, "No, you come up here, I walked all the way up the hill, I'm tired and I'm not walking down and all the way up again!" and he said "No, you come down here!", and this went on for a bit, and then I just kept walking up the hill.
I still don't know what's wrong with the French police though. The whole world knows about these scammers, and why they don't go and arrest them all I cannot fathom.